Holy Week: The things that make for peace

And throwing their garments on the colt, they set Jesus upon it. And as he rode along, they spread their garments on the road. 

The disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, saying, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!" 

… And when Jesus drew near and saw the city he wept over it, saying, "Would that even today you knew the things that make for peace!"     (Luke 19)

"Blessed be the King who comes in the name of the Lord," the cry goes up.  People throw palm branches into the road in front of him as Jesus approaches, a poor man's ticker-tape parade.

Around a bend, there suddenly is Jerusalem. Jesus draws back on the reins. Crying disfigures his face. "Would that even today you knew the things that make for peace." 

The things that make for peace.  We do not know these things, Jesus says, and God knows he's right. The absence of peace within our own skins no less than within our nations testifies to that. 

So as Holy Week begins, let us name instead the one who is himself the Prince of Peace.

Jesus is our only hope: the hope that finally by the grace of God the impossible will happen. 

Despair and hope. They travel the road to Jerusalem together, as together they travel every road we take ---despair at what we bring down upon our own heads and hope in him who travels the road with us and for us.  

Hope in the King who approaches every human heart like a city. And it is a very great hope as hopes go and well worth all our singing and dancing and sad little palms because not even death can prevail against this King and not even the end of the world, when end it does, will be the end of him and of the mystery and majesty of his love. 

Blessed be he.            (adapted from Frederick Buechner)

Lent 1: at the far side of the wilderness

Then you will call and the Lord will answer. You will cry for help and God will say, "I'm here." Isaiah 58:9

Moses led the flock he was tending to the far side of the wilderness
and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.  
There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush...
Moses thought, 'I will go over and see this strange sight--why the bush does not burn up.'  
When the Lord saw that Moses had gone over to look,
God called to him from within the bush, 'Moses! Moses!'  
And Moses said, 'Here I am.'    Exodus 3:1-4

Where does Moses encounter God?  On the far side of the wilderness--that out of the way, untamed place where Moses slows down & tends his flock in quiet.  It's the ideal place for God to capture his attention.  Alone with his sheep, Moses can't help but see the steadily burning bush. He draws closer until God calls him by name: "Moses! Moses!" In this intimate meeting, God touches Moses to the depths of his heart.
During this time of Lent, I'm invited to travel to the far side of the wilderness, a place where nothing much is happening. In those moments away from the everyday chatter, manifestations of God's strange blazing beauty wait for me.  There God calls me by my name and hopes for my response, "Here I am."

Your wilderness can be a graced place.  Be still and let the things of God touch your heart.  Wait for God to whisper your name, to light a flame in your spirit, to speak of how beloved you are.